As technology advances, consumer electronics tend to become smaller and less expensive. One technology area where this trend is clear is with regard to positioning technology. For example, early Global Positioning System (“GPS”) receiver systems were large and bulky, mainly suitable for use on automobiles, ships, and planes. Hand-held receivers were later developed, and today it is common to have GPS receiver technology integrated with cellular phones and personal digital assistants (“PDA”s).
One consequence of this miniaturization and integration trend is that cross-communication among different devices becomes possible. For example, a cellular phone that can determine its location (whether by GPS or other methods) may then leverage access to the cellular network to send and receive information about that location over the Internet. Access to such a network provides the ability to receive updated maps, access information about the local area (e.g., traffic data, weather forecasts, local business information, etc.), improve route finding functionality, and notify others of the device's current location. However, certain aspects of these functions may require the device to report the device's current location to a remote server.
Due to their mobile nature, portable devices rely heavily on battery power. The acts of determining and reporting the device's location each require active processing, and thus the device must “awake” from a power saving configuration. The more frequent the polling and reporting, the greater the drain on the device's battery.